


The Hole at the Center of the World

by StormDancer



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Inception Fusion, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:48:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21839983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StormDancer/pseuds/StormDancer
Summary: You can’t give the dreamer everything they want. That’s when they know it’s a dream.
Relationships: Tyson Barrie & Nathan MacKinnon, Tyson Barrie/Gabriel Landeskog
Comments: 18
Kudos: 131





	The Hole at the Center of the World

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Landeskog case](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19992799) by [Liffis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liffis/pseuds/Liffis). 



> So this is...me getting out my feelings about the trade through AUs, I guess? Also I read an Inception fic for this pairing that I liked a lot but also made me want to try my hand at my own. And then I came up with a title, so the fic was born. I hope whatever it's doing works! 
> 
> Also, I haven't watched Inception in maybe a decade and haven't read Inception fic in a while, so forgive my vague recollections at how it all works. 
> 
> Don't know anything about anyone, don't own anything, etc. etc. 
> 
> Enjoy!
> 
> UPDATE 1/1/2020: I previously neglected to link to the fic that inspired this fic, which I am very sorry for. The fic that sparked this one is [The Landeskog case](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19992799) by Liffis, and you should all go read that!

Gabe wakes up.

It’s a bright, beautiful day. The sky is blue, the air is crisp, the mountains are in the distance. It’s the kind of day where things happen. An important day. Gabe tells himself that. To remember it.

Gabe rolls out of bed. He has plenty to do—they’re getting close to biggest deal of his career, one that’ll make his company millions. The blue sky feels right for that sort of day.

He makes the breakfast he has time for—a smoothie, double sized so that there’s enough for two. He’s early enough getting to the office that he stops for coffee at the café before work. It’s crowded, people pressing in around him. He orders his usual, and the barista smiles at him, scrawls his name on the cup before he says it.

When he picks up his coffee, there’s another cup there, waiting, with a name on it. Gabe picks it up, hands it to the guy next to him—a shorter guy, with curly hair and brown eyes that focus on him for a second, his lips twitching just a little.

“Here,” Gabe tells him, thinking about the deal still.

“Thanks,” the guy says, but Gabe heads to his office, the skyscraper reaching up chrome and metal into the sky.

* * *

Nate watches Landeskog walk out of the coffee shop. He’s in here almost every day—a nice weak point in his security. A good point to drop something in his coffee, maybe. They can’t grab him here, but it’s a fine first step.

“We’ll need someone to charm a barista,” he says out loud, thoughtfully. No one answers—no one else is at his table. There never was. Josty should pick up Landeskog at work, so Nate has to get back to the warehouse, where Cale’s busy.

Nate grabs a couple pastries, then gets up. Cale’s good but he’s new, and Nate needs to check in with him.

It’s not easy, after all, no matter how many times you do it. Not easy to build a dream.

* * *

It’s not a complicated job, or it shouldn’t be. Or—all dreams are complicated, because dreamsharing is complicated, but as far as extraction goes, this one is fairly straightforward. Nate told the guys that, and he still thinks it’s true. Landeskog is doing a big deal with Duchene’s company; Duchene wants to know the guy’s on the level. Nate needed to get his team together, all his best guys, and see what his secrets are.

“Easy money,” Nate had told them, when they’d first gathered. No one had given him shit about it, which he—was surprised about. He wasn’t usually the one leading these things.

But he still thinks it shouldn’t be hard. He’s worked with the guys before, anyway, or most of them. Josty’s a good forger and getting better. Comph is learning the switch to Chemist well. And of course Nate trusts their architect; he always trusts the architect.

And Nate, of course. But Nate knows what he can do. He can extract. He knows that. Even if leading is—a little harder.

* * *

Gabe goes to work. Comes home. The house is empty, which—of course it is. He lives alone. He should maybe get a dog. He signs back on to work, but before that, he calls his sister.

“You really should get a dog,” she tells him. Gabe snorts, but he likes the idea of it. Someone would need to walk her, though. “Or, you know. Someone else.”

“I’m fine.”

“Gabe,” she sighs, like she always does. “You aren’t meant to be alone.”

“What does that mean?” Gabe complains, rolling his eyes. “I’m busy, that’s all. That’s why I haven’t…”

“That’s what you always say,” she tells him. “You’re busy. How long will you use that excuse?”

“As long as I need to,” Gabe tells her. They talk more. They hang up. Gabe sighs at the phone. She’s right, he’s sure of it. He’s not meant to be alone. But it’s not an excuse, either. He can feel it in his bones. He’s not putting off finding someone because he’s busy. He doesn’t want to be alone. Doesn’t want to live like this, with just the deal that feels so…tiring. But he’s—waiting. For something.

* * *

Landeskog has a few weak points—points they need to get to soon, because the deadline of the deal is approaching. His coffee. His morning runs. He goes out with Duchene more than once, too, which Nate thinks they can use. The men look like they’re friends. Even if one of those friends is hiring dreamthieves to go snooping in the other one’s mind.

Nate’s pretty sure some people think that means there can’t be a friendship. He disagrees, though. What’s friendship if you haven’t crawled through each other’s dreams and shot a bunch of projections and then each other to bring you out of it? What’s friendship if you haven’t watched them build beautiful things you didn’t think were possible, horrific things you didn’t want to know were possible, ridiculous things just to make everyone laugh?

“How’s the building going,” he asks Cale, when he wakes up and takes out the IV. Nate glances at the levels, but they’re using the usual somnacin for this, nothing fancy.

“Good, I think. Do you want to see?”

Nate shakes his head. “Later.” He has plans to make. He thinks a weekend run is the best time to grab Landeskog; there’s plenty of isolated space and they can deliver him to a hospital afterwards, make it seem like he hurt himself running.

“When’s Tyson coming back?” Cale asks, coiling up the IV line.

Nate raises an eyebrow at him. “You mean Josty?” he asks, and Cale nods, shrugs. He’s new. Not used to nicknames yet. “Soon.”

* * *

Gabe goes out to dinner with Duchene. It’s important that they’re friends—it’s what’ll make the deal stick. Gabe knows this, so he goes. Even if his empty home might be better.

“I’ll have to bring you home sometime, so you can meet Ashley,” Duchene tells Gabe, heartily. “You’ll love her.”

Gabe raises his eyebrows. “I will?”

“Everyone loves her,” Duchene tells him, confident. “She’s just one of those people, you know?”

Gabe nods. He knows people like that—people who can light up a room just by existing. Who make Gabe turn towards them. But he doubts Duchene’s wife is that.

“Maybe once the deal is signed,” he says, and Duchene laughs. Gabe doesn’t.

“A reward, I get it. It’s always about work with you, isn’t it?”

Gabe doesn’t think it is. Gabe thinks—this is what life is, isn’t it? It’s what it’s always been.

“Dessert?” the waitress asks, when they’re done. Duchene shakes his head, pats his stomach.

“I think I’m done.”

Gabe looks at the menu. It takes him a second to focus. Then,

“I’ll have the chocolate cake,” he says. The waitress stares at him for a second. Then she goes.

“Enough not work for you?” Gabe asks. Sharper than he should. That’s not why he ordered it. But it tastes like something new.

* * *

“What do you think?” Cale asks, gesturing. He’s made a perfect replica of Landeskog’s childhood home in Sweden, as far as they can tell. Nate takes a long, slow circle. Looks outside to where Comph is doing a perimeter check, to make sure the edges fold in right. The house itself is the maze.

“It looks good,” he tells Cale, and Cale glows with the praise. It pings at Nate. Has he not been giving enough praise? Has he not been doing enough? He doesn’t know. He can’t rely on anyone here to tell him. “Walk me through the design.”

Cale does—up and around the twisting stairs. The safe, the childhood hideaway. The woods that will guard against projections as long as they can get it.

“And look!” Cale says, proud, as a dog runs in. She’s a grey pit bull, the sort Landeskog looks at on his phone sometimes. “He always wanted a dog.”

Nate pets her, but shakes his head. “No dog.”

“But—”

“You can’t give a dreamer everything he wants,” Nate recites. He’s heard it often enough. “They don’t trust it. When something’s wrong, that’s when you think it’s real.”

Cale dims, but he nods, like he’s committing it to memory. It’s the sort of intensity that Nate had, that extractors had. It’s good. But it makes Nate sad, too. It can’t be all you have. You need to remember that sometimes it’s good to dream yourself into a WWE match, just to try it out.

Cale’ll learn, though. They all did. Even if this job seems to drag.

Nate looks around the house again. He’s ready for this job to be over. It’s time to move.

* * *

Gabe’s running in the park. It’s hot, and he pushes his hair back. It’s getting long, but he doesn’t want to cut it. People like his hair. Maybe he should get it cut before he closes with Duchene, though. For the pictures.

He stops for water, and another runner comes towards him, from the other way. He’s cute, with a flush on his sharp cheekbones and his shirt sticking to his chest. “Hey,” the runner says, “The path’s flooded, to the left. You should probably turn right.”

Gabe nods, takes the tip. “Thanks,” he says. The other runner smiles. Gabe feels it in his gut. He picks up his shirt to wipe the sweat off his face. There’s a reason Gabe shouldn’t watch him. It’s dangerous. It’s always dangerous, to get too close to other people.

There’s a sputter. “You’re unfair,” the other runner says, shaking his head. 

“What’s that mean?” Gabe asks. The runner snorts.

“Yeah, you’d like to know,” he tells him, then shakes his head. His lips twitch. “Have a good run.”

“You too,” Gabe tells him, and keeps going.

He turns right. He doesn’t usually go this way, but he’s pretty sure it circles around about the same distance. It’s a nice run. It’s—

“Oh, thank fuck, there you are.” Someone else is jogging up to him. He’s tall and blonde, rangy. “For someone acting as a CEO you’re a hard fucking man to find, you know that?”

Gabe blinks. “Who are you?”

“Hmph. The guy who’s going to save your ass,” the guy says. He grins, and his toothless gums show. “Like usual.”

“Not like usual,” Gabe retorts. He—no. This guy doesn’t save him, usually. That’s not how it works. He’s—he doesn’t know him. He’s a CEO, he doesn’t need saving. His head hurts. He—

“Right, sure. We need to go find the others, though, before they accidentally kill you.” EJ rolls his eyes. “Come on.”

“What?”

“Let’s go, keep up,” EJ says, and it’s stupid but Gabe does. People are turning to look at him, now. Runners. Moms and their kids. He feels noticed, squirmy. Like something’s wrong and he should know it.

EJ drags him back to the fork in the road, then to the left fork, the one Gabe usually goes down. Gabe frowns at it.

“I thought this was flooded.”

“What? No, some dicks are just hiding here. Yo, Nate Dogg. Cut it out,” EJ says, louder. Gabe blinks again. Nate Dogg. Nate. EJ. His head pangs again, harder. He—

“What the fuck?” Someone comes out from behind a tree, also a big blond guy, with a strong jaw and set shoulders. Then another guy—shorter, with dark curly hair. Gabe’s head is killing him.

“Good, Josty, you’re here too. I need you all to remember,” EJ says, and Nate and Josty are rubbing at their temples too.

“Remember what?” Gabe demands. He doesn’t know what is happening, but he knows it’s wrong.

EJ grabs his shoulders. “You’re in too deep. Remember? We tried a new blend of somnacin—” Nate makes a sound—“I blame Willy, personally, but he says it’s not his fault. Whatever. Gabe.” EJ shakes him. It screams in Gabe’s head, down his spine. “ _Remember.”_

And—Gabe does.

“Oh, fuck,” he says, and shakes his head to clear it. It still burns a little, but a good sort of burn, like it’s clearing away the edges. He can see Nate and Josty doing the same. He remembers. Remembers the job—an extraction on Duchene. Remembers hatching a plan with Nate and EJ, to get one of them close to him by being a buyer in a deal. Remembers the new strain of somnacin, to get around a militarized subconscious by dulling their own memories of the dream. 

Remembers going to sleep, back in the real world.

“Yeah,” EJ says, and smiles, a little smug. “Told you I was saving your asses.”

* * *

“Okay, regroup,” Gabe says. He’s at the warehouse now. This feels—better, Nate thinks. This is why everything felt weird. Nate is a point man, he’s not extractor. That’s how it works. This is how it was. His head still hurts, from remembering. “EJ. Make sure we’re up to speed?”

“Right.” EJ stands up. Something twists in Nate’s stomach at the sight of him. How had he forgotten EJ? “So. We were hired to extract information from Matt Duchene, CEO of Predator Inc. He’s got pretty good security, though, so we decided we needed to take a more complicated tack, and someone—” he gives Gabe a look, telling. Gabe tosses back his hair. He looks like a stallion, Nate thinks. That’s what he always said. With his great mane of hair. “Decided to go with a new somnacin blend, that would blur the edges. It was supposed to make us more invisible to his projections, but something went wrong. You all forgot instead. So I, your trusted guardian on the outside, came in to drag your sorry asses out.”

Nate nods. That tracks. He remembers that, he thinks—remembers going to sleep.

“So now the projections are going to notice us?” Gabe asks, sharp. He feels realer than he had. There’s still something empty in his eyes. Nate wonders if that’s something the dream put there, or if he only noticed it because of the dream. He’s not sure what’s worse.

EJ shrugs. “Willy’s the chemist, and he’s up there. I’m not sure. But it would make sense.”

“How did you know we were lost?” Josty asks, his head tilted.

“I got—someone told Willy to check,” EJ says, slow. Nate sits up. “He said that there was a note. Or someone left it?”

“Right,” Gabe says. Fast. Nate thinks there’s something wrong with that, that they should ask more questions, but they need to focus on Duchene now. The job. There’s always the job. The job will keep all of them safe. “Okay. Catch me up.”

“Shouldn’t we go up, restart?” Nate asks. They’ve planned for Gabe. Not for Duchene.

Gabe’s jaw sets. “No.”

“But—” Comph starts, and Gabe whirls.

“We can’t start over,” Gabe snaps.

“But—”

“We can’t risk it,” Gabe says, in a tone that brooks no argument. No one says anything. The silence stretches, infinite, longer than it should. Gabe looks around, like even he expects someone to say something. But no one does. Instead, everyone looks at each other, a little awkward. “Good,” Gabe says at last. His eyes glint, like ice. Like the center of a flame. Like something brilliant and desperate. “So. Catch me up.”

* * *

Gabe works. It feels right. This is what he’d missed, he thinks. This is what he’d needed.

He still plays the part. It’s easy. To be the CEO, to be the lonely man in his tower. To look at Duchene and smile and play the part. To win trust he didn’t know he needed. He’s good at this, he remembers. Though he can’t get a big head—a bigger head, he thinks, and can’t remember who said that first.

But it’s better. To be part of a team. It slides into place: the fact that he needed them. Needed Nate, his right hand. Needed EJ to take care of them all.

He works. He plans. He watches. He tells Duchene what he needs and waits for him to dream out the secret. Even if—it itches, sometimes. Maybe the remnants of the dream. Maybe the knowledge that every minute more they take to plan is a minute they aren’t doing.

“It’s taking too long,” he tells Nate, EJ. Everyone else has cleared out. They’re afraid, Gabe thinks. He knows he’s been on edge. But he can’t help it. They need to move.

“We can’t rush it,” Nate says. Reluctant.

“It’s taking too long,” Gabe repeats. They don’t have this kind of time. “We have to do something.”

“He’ll spook, Gabe,” EJ says. Surprisingly gentle. Like he knows it hurts.

“I don’t care,” Gabe snaps. “I want—”

“Getting killed won’t help anyone,” EJ retorts, sharper. Nate watches, face pale. “What could we do, to hurry it up, anyway?”

Gabe glares, for a moment, then turns on his heel, stalks away. What can they do? Anything. It’s a dream. Anything is possible.

* * *

Nate watches Duchene. It’s easy enough, to switch his surveillance to Duchene.

He watches Gabe, too, though. Watches as he rages around the warehouse, as he smiles sharp and hard at Duchene.

“Is he always like this?” he hears Cale asks Josty once, quiet. Watching Gabe as he stalks away from Cale.

Josty snorts. “No, he’s—no. Normally he’s fun.”

“Normally he’s light,” Comph interrupts. He shakes his head. “It’s not your fault, Cale.”

“He doesn’t like me.”

“It’s not you,” Nate tells him. That’s not—he’s not the one to soothe tempers, usually, but he can if he has to. He’s learned. “He’s stressed.”

“We all are.”

“Yeah,” Josty adds, and looks at Nate, like a challenge. “Usually he’s chiller, though. What’s crawled up his ass?”

“Tyson!” Comph hisses. He’s right, though. Nate knows it. Knows Gabe’s snapping more than usual. Knows that everyone’s feeling it, never satisfied, never good.

“What, I’m right,” Josty argues. They don’t argue, not really. But they are now. “He like, has barely even laughed. Even since he remembered us.”

Nate looks around, at the long stretch of the city, at the fog of the dream. “What’s there to laugh for?”

* * *

Gabe’s not good at waiting. Time stretches, as it does in dreams, as long and short as a moment. He knows everyone else is on edge, that he’s pushing them too hard, but he can’t stop. They can’t stop.

If they stop, he’ll have to think. He’ll have to face the fact that working isn’t filling the hole in him. That he still aches, lonely. Waiting.

He takes the train to work. Watches as the projections talk to each other. There’s a guy there whose laugh rings out, clear and wry, and he watches as the projection the man is talking to smiles too, laughs. Gabe takes a breath. Lets it out. Feels his shoulders, still tight.

He and Duchene go to a bar after work. The projections crowd around them. Gabe watches, wary. He knows his team is there too, in case. But there are still so many. They can’t come out of this empty-handed. Not this job.

He buys Duchene more and more beers, waiting for him to stumble a little. Duchene’s far in when someone stumbles into him, knocking him over into Gabe, just a little. Duchene spins, just drunk enough to be angry.

“Watch it!” he spits out, at the guy.

The guy’s jaw is set back. He’s cute, short and curly-haired, with a mobile mouth that looks like it should be smiling. “Dream on,” he retorts, then his lips twist, just a little, like there’s a private joke only he’s in on. Gabe finds himself wanting, for an instant, to be in on that joke too. It’s a feeling he almost recognizes.

“Maybe I will,” Duchene snaps back, straightening like he’s ready for a fight. The guy looks back at him, then his eyes flick to Gabe. Gabe straightens too, unconscious. But not to get ready for a fight. The projection just makes him—

“Good,” the guy says. His eyes are a clear, bright brown. “You can change things, in dreams.”

Gabe’s mouth opens. Closes. The guy waits, then—he rolls his eyes, and disappears into the crowd.

Duchene turns back to him. “Do you know that works, though?” he asks, that edge of superior that means he wants to explain something.

Gabe raises an eyebrow. “What works?”

“Dreams,” Duchene says, and the word echoes.

* * *

Gabe comes storming into the warehouse, like usual. “He knows about dreaming,” he says, and everyone stops.

“Yeah,” Nate says, slow. “We knew he was militarized.”

“Okay, but he knows here,” Gabe says. He throws off his jacket and starts to pace. He’s almost hard to look at, harsh and sharp and too bright, like the dream has cut away everything but the core of him. “Do you know how much harder this’ll make it?”

“Gabe—”

“We’ll need a new plan,” Gabe interrupts, whirling on the kids. “Cale. What can we make?”

Cale sputters, a little. Nate looks at EJ, who’s looking back. He knows what they need. Can almost see it. But. But Gabe in a mood won’t listen. Not to Nate, at least, and not to anyone here.

He listens to Gabe raise hell with the kids, EJ get between them. They start to yell—about what won’t work, about how it can’t. Nate shakes his head. He—this isn’t right. Everything feels harder than it should. Maybe they should wake up. Nate’s almost tempted to shoot himself out of the dream, just to get away.

He gets coffee. It’s easier, outside of the warehouse. Where the air isn’t steeped in that hard-edged desperation, heavier than he remembers.

“You okay, man?” Nate looks over. There’s another man there, waiting for his coffee. He has a face that looks familiar, which is a little worrying, but maybe it’s just that sort of face—sharp cheekbones and brown eyes and a warm sort of smile.

“Yeah,” Nate says shortly. Talking to projections just makes more problems.

“Don’t look it,” the projection tells him. He picks up a coffee, curls his hands around it. It’s a sugary monstrosity; when he takes a sip whipped cream sticks to his nose. “I know it’s none of my business, but usually when you look that bad it’s worse inside.”

Nate lets out a long breath. He doesn’t want to raise suspicions. “Work is…tough,” he says. “My boss is…”

“Boss problems, yeah, I get those,” the man says. “They’re the worst, aren’t they?”

“He’s not too bad,” Nate protests. Loyalty. He’s good at that, he guesses. “He’s just stressed. But it means he’s missing solutions.”

“Solutions you have?” the projection asks. His lips twitch again.

“I mean. I have ideas. But my boss, he’s the one in charge, and he won’t—”

“Then make him,” The projection interrupts, hot. But when Nate looks at him, he has that slightly wry expression on, still. “I mean, you look like the kind of guy with good ideas. Why shouldn’t your boss listen to you?”

“Because—”

“Why shouldn’t he?” the projection interrupts again, and it settles in Nate, somewhere in his bones, somewhere that makes him feel—the dream, he thinks.

“Yeah,” he says, slow. He takes his drink. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” the guys says, and for a second his smile flickers. Then he leaves, and so does Nate.

Nate goes back to the warehouse. Gabe’s still badgering Cale, and EJ’s still badgering Gabe.

“We have to go down another layer,” Nate says, loud enough they all look at him.

“We don’t have time to plan another layer,” Gabe bites out at him. Nate pushes down the urge to respond in kind. 

“We don’t have time not to,” Nate retorts, setting his shoulders. He feels—alone, with all of them staring at him. But better. “He’s not going to respond to us here. We need to go deeper.”

“You got lost on one level, we shouldn’t do two—”

“Two’s not much of a risk,” Nate interrupts EJ. “We can handle two. Gabe. We need to handle two.”

Gabe’s hands are curling into fists. Nate knows he hates the delay. But Nate’s right, he knows it. He doesn’t want delay either, knows they need this, but he wants to do this right, too. There’s nothing more important than finishing this job.

The silence stretches on, as Gabe teeters on the edge.

Then—“Okay,” he says. “What are you thinking?”

Nate lets out a long breath.

* * *

Nate’s plan is a good one. It’s not even a long one. One more layer, taking advantage of Duchene’s long-held dreams. He won’t suspect there. Gabe should have thought of it. Maybe he would have, if he wasn’t stretched so thin. If he didn’t feel like everything was circling, like a whirlpool draining down. He needs this done.

“Yelling at Cale won’t make him work faster,” EJ tells him, after Cale’s run his plans by Gabe and Gabe gave him some critiques. “He’s good. Let him work.”

“I’m not yelling.”

“You are,” EJ says. “It’s not—me, I could take it, so could Nate. But Cale’s new. He doesn’t get it.”

Gabe scowls. “Then he shouldn’t be on the team.”

“Gabe—”

“No!” Gabe yells, at whirls around to stalk back to his desk. EJ follows him. “No, I don’t—so he’s young. So he’s good. I don’t care, if he doesn’t get the job done. I don’t care about anything if the job isn’t done.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” EJ retorts. “You can’t think like that. That won’t help anyone.”

“It doesn’t work like that. I can’t just—stop thinking like that. It’s true.” Gabe stares at the plans on his desk, the copies of what Cale had made, the notations in copperplate print. It looks wrong. It’s good, precise and what Gabe had asked for, and he knows it. But it’s wrong. The letters blur, until they’re messier, slanted; until Gabe could almost have yelled and been met by argument that would anneal an idea into something magic. He blinks.

“Don’t take that out on Cale,” EJ tells him. “It’s not his fault he’s the one who’s here.”

Gabe knows. It doesn’t make him feel better.

* * *

They’re ready. One more layer. The plan for the grab is set. Nate’s ready to dream them into the dream Cale’s designed. Nate knows they’re ready. He just feels—

He waits, for the signal. Gabe’s going to get Duchene back to his apartment. Easy. Nate loiters outside the building.

“You need something?” a projection asks, coming out of the building. Nate stiffens. If the projections are pinging on them, they need to move fast.

“Just waiting for a friend,” Nate says, with his friendliest smile. The projection smiles back, easy, and pushes his curls off his forehead.

“Well, good luck,” He says. He takes a second, looks deeper at Nate. “Be safe out there, eh?”

They definitely need to move, Nate thinks. “Of course,” Nate tells him, and the projection nods and keeps going.

Nate presses his lips together. He can’t—this has to work. It will. He won’t let it not.

* * *

Gabe wakes in a hockey locker room. Next to him, EJ’s pulling on skates. So is Duchene.

“Ready, boys?” The coach asks, and Gabe blinks as Duchene straightens to listen. Josty’s doing well, he thinks, in his forgery of Duchene’s childhood hockey coach. The details of the dream are perfect. Cale did a good job, he has to admit. He knew. Anything he feels about Cale has nothing to do with his skill, or even the kid himself.

Gabe over at Duchene. There’s an A on his chest, like there had been when he’d played. Cale had wanted to make him a C, but Gabe had talked him down. Give a man everything he wants, and he knows it’s a dream.

“Okay, let’s get out there, play a good game,” Josty-coach says, and Gabe gets up.

They play. Gabe’s played before, and this is a dream, anyway, and Cale had designed the other team, even if Duchene filled it in. They win. Of course they win.

“Good game, eh?” Duchene says, bright and excited, when they go into the locker room. It’s loud and raucous with a win, even EJ getting into it, and Gabe gets it. Winning feels good. It doesn’t feel like they’ve won at all, since they came into the dream. But it’s not good enough, not enough.

The press comes in, and Comph, with a microphone, hurries over to Duchene. “So let’s talk about your game,” he says, as Duchene preens. “What’s your secret?”

Gabe watches. It’s coming together.

It’s still coming together when they go to the bar as a team. Duchene is light and loose with his win, talking freely. It’s easy enough to guide the situation. To make him talk about what Gabe wants him to talk about. To think about what he wants him to think about. For him to dream what Gabe wants him to dream.

* * *

Nate waits. Watches the unconscious body of his friends, of Duchene, and waits. Hopes.

Something explodes, a few buildings away, and he straightens. Looks out, his hand on his gun.

Another explosion. He glances at the bodies of his friends, but the kick won’t be for a while yet, and the room is secure. He needs to check this out. He gets up, slips out of the room.

* * *

Gabe follows Duchene back to the house Cale had made for him. Waits for him to sleep, then slips into the house, finds the safe in the wall. Swings it open.

“Fuck,” he breathes.

“What’s up?” EJ asks, over their comms.

“Empty.”

“Fuck,” EJ echoes. Gabe looks at the safe. They need this. If they don’t get it—where else would Duchene keep his secrets?

Gabe feels his heart beat once, twice. “Comph, Josty, check the rink,” he tells the team. “Check his locker. He’ll keep it there. EJ, let’s meet at the rink too.”

Duchene’s house is close enough to the rink to walk, so Gabe does. There’s a Dairy Queen on the way; the lights blink when Gabe walks by.

Gabe doesn’t really like Dairy Queen. He walks in.

It’s almost empty, except for the server. Gabe orders a blizzard, then sits down. Comph and Josty will be a little while, and the kick will be longer still. He has time.

“How did you know?” Someone sits down across from him. Gabe recognizes him, he thinks. Curly hair, sharp cheekbones. Bright eyes. Strong arms. Someone Duchene must know, must love, to bring him everywhere.

“Know what?”

“To look at the rink.”

Gabe shouldn’t talk about it. Not to a projection. But they’re so nearly done. And Gabe’s been wanting this so much—to have someone to talk to.

“Some secrets aren’t for putting in a safe and hiding,” he tells the projection. The projection’s tongue flicks out to lick his ice cream. “Some you want to keep close and look at all the time.”

The projection flushes. “What’s that kind of secret?”

“The kind you love,” Gabe says. The projection nearly drops his ice cream. Gabe watches, somehow fond, as it gets all over his fingers. Laughs. The fondness shifts as the projection licks it off his fingers.

“Ugh, you’re awful,” the projection tells him. Gabe laughs again. “You can’t just—” He shakes his head. “You need to remember that, Gabe.”

“Remember what?”

The projection looks at him, suddenly intent. It doesn’t match the blizzard dripping on his fingers, or the taste of sugar and chocolate in Gabe’s mouth, except for how it does.

“The secret,” he says. “The thing you don’t talk about. The thing you keep too close to even think about.”

“What does that mean?” Gabe demands. He knows it’s a dream, but that’s unnecessarily cryptic even for dreams.

“That you have to remember, Landeskog.” The projection sets down his blizzard. “I need you to remember for me.”

He looks like he’s ready to get up. He doesn’t. He looks—lonely, Gabe thinks. Recognizes.

The comm buzzes in Gabe’s ear. “We have it,” Josty says. “Where are you, Gabe?”

Gabe stands. “I’ve got to go.”

“I know.” The projection looks up at him. “Good luck,” he says, and Gabe smiles. Goes.

He gets to the rink, where the rest of the team is waiting for him, the secret tucked in EJ’s pocket. “Where were you?” EJ demands, as the music starts to play to signal the kick.

Gabe blinks. Shrugs. “I got ice cream,” he says, and EJ nods understandingly as the dream shakes apart.

* * *

Nate gets back to the room in plenty of time for the kick. He’s still not sure what set off the explosions, but he does know that there’s no hiding anymore—Duchene’s subconscious knows they’re here, and they’re ready for them to go.

He sets the kick, the music, lets it go—and everyone except for Duchene wakes.

Gabe sits up, rips out the IV. He looks paler than usual.

“We good?” Nate asks.

Gabe rubs at his jaw. “Got it,” he says. “Let’s go.”

Nate looks at EJ. “Is there a kick?”

EJ swallows. “I don’t know,” he says. “We weren’t sure how long it would take or what was wrong with you.”

“Well then.” Gabe draws the gun at his hip. “We do this the old-fashioned way.”

“Ugh,” Josty groans, but the gunshots ring out anyway.

* * *

Colin’s there as Gabe sits up, taking the IV out.

“Thank god,” he says, helping everyone else to their feet. “Everyone feel okay?”

There are nods all around. Gabe looks around at the hotel room they’d taken control of, while Duchene was on a business trip. It’s been a night, probably. Maybe more.

“No suspicion that he was gone this long?” Gabe asks.

Colin shakes his head. “We’re golden.”

“Good.” Gabe looks at Duchene, who’s still asleep. His face is smooth, unworried. Still dreaming of playing hockey, he thinks. Of his secrets. Of his world where he has almost everything he wants. “Then let’s go.”

* * *

Nate goes with Gabe to the meet with the client. Gabe’s still got that thin, vibrating energy. Nate thinks he’ll keep it until they finish the job. Nate gets it. It doesn’t feel done yet. They haven’t gotten anything in return.

“Here,” Gabe says, and throws the flash drive on the table. The room is dark, the only light on the woman they’re meeting—a neat looking red head with sharp eyes, sitting in a chair behind the table with legs crossed under a pencil skirt. “Now where’s our payment?”

The woman smiles. “Is money worth being so impatient for?” she asks. She reaches under her jacket—Nate puts a hand on his gun—but she just pulls out a phone. She pushes a few buttons. “The money should be in your account now,” she says.

Nate pulls out his own phone to check, but there the wire transfer is. He nods to Gabe.

Gabe nods to her. “Good doing business with you,” he tells her, and leaves. Nate follows him. Looks behind him, at the nondescript office building.

“Did that feel easy?” he asks.

“Don’t argue with easy,” Gabe replies, but his eyes are still shadowed. Nate doesn’t know how to stop that. Not when he feels it too.

* * *

Gabe goes home.

Home, to his dog and his apartment.

It’s not the empty CEO’s apartment of the dream, though it’s still minimalist. How he likes it, he thinks. He has no reason to fill it with stuff, with the warmth of blankets and random shit that some people like, or with people coming in and out when they need. He still buys a throw blanket later. It lends some warmth. Not enough, though.

Zoey’s almost enough, though. He calls his mother, his sister. Goes out with the guys. The job is done and the money is in his account. He won. They won.

It doesn’t explain why he still feels—stretched. Like he’s going to fall out of his skin. He wants. He needs.

“I’ve said it’s time to settle down,” Bea tells him on the phone, and Gabe scoffs. Why would he need to find someone new? But maybe she’s right. Maybe that’s what he needs. Maybe he’ll find someone to make him laugh, to settle the way he feels on the edge of spinning out of control. To stop the way Nate and EJ look at him like he’s going to explode.

But that’s dangerous, in this job. Gabe’s always known that. Letting someone close is a weakness.

Maybe he needs another job. Another job. That’ll get him what he needs.

* * *

Time passes. Nate knows Gabe is looking for another job for them, and he’s ready, but for now, Nate just—waits. He works, looking for jobs of his own, touching base with his contact. He tries to cook, fails miserably.

“Bro, you need to get out of the house more,” EJ tells him, one day when he comes over. He looks around Nate’s house.

“I’m fine.”

“Sure.” EJ raises his eyebrows. “What’s really wrong?”

Nate shakes his head. Then sighs. “We fucked up, on the Duchene job.”

“We finished it out.”

“Yeah, but—only because you and Willy figured out something was wrong. If you hadn’t…” Nate trails off. “I should have known more about that somnacin strain.”

“Gabe shouldn’t have chosen to use it,” EJ retorts. “He’s in charge and he knew it was a risk, he should have—”

“I’m the one who should have known,” Nate cuts him off. He’s the pointman. His job is to know things like that. He needs to know everything, so Gabe can make the right decisions. If he doesn’t know, things go wrong. They almost get lost in a dream. They almost lose—everything. “I can’t let that happen again.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” EJ tells him, rolling his eyes. “Gabe made a rash decision, because—well. Because he had to. But that’s not your fault.”

“I didn’t stop him,” Nate retorts. He gets what EJ’s trying to do, and he’s thankful for it. But it doesn’t make him believe it. EJ can’t make him take the burden off. It was his fault. That whole long, awful stretch of a dream was on him.

* * *

Time stretches on.

Gabe goes to EJ’s for a party, because there’s no use resisting. He doesn’t want to. Spending time with friends might help, he thinks. Nothing else has. Working out. Looking for jobs. He even went on a date, had to leave. It didn’t work. It wasn’t right. He can’t sit still. He can’t wait. So it’s easier to go to EJ’s, when EJ tells him, with an eyeroll, that maybe it will stop him being so miserable all the time.

Gabe doesn’t feel miserable. But he goes anyway.

The whole team is there, in EJ’s backyard over the bright summer sun. They didn’t scatter this time, because. Gabe takes a drink from EJ, looks over them all. His team. His. He should be happy.

He drinks. He eats. He circulates. It’s subdued, but not in a way that makes it seem like anyone is unhappy. Just—quiet. Wrong.

Something’s missing, Gabe thinks. He doesn’t know what. Doesn’t know how to fix it. But it’s not right.

“Here, take this,” Nate says, handing Gabe a bowl of chocolate ice cream. “EJ keeps trying to make me eat it.”

“You need more meat on your bones,” EJ tells Nate, unrepentant, as Nate makes a face at him.

“Ice cream isn’t a good way to do that,” he retorts. “Eating healthily is the best way to maintain—”

“Not having fun at my party isn’t an option, I’m sorry.”

Gabe takes an absent bite of the ice cream as he listens to them bicker. Nate’s been too solemn recently, he thinks. This is probably good.

“What are best friends for, if not to make you break the rules?” EJ asks, ruffling Nate’s hair, and Nate shoves him away. Gabe takes another bite of the ice cream.

“You aren’t my best friend,” Nate retorts.

“Ouch! Come on, you love me.”

“I have a best friend,” Nate says, “You’re just an annoyance.”

The chocolate is sweet, cloying. It tastes like summer. It tastes like the inside of a Dairy Queen. Like eyes with a smile in the corner of them.

“Nate,” Gabe interrupts. His hand is shaking. His head hurts. Ice cream headache, he’d think. Except. “Nate. Who’s your best friend?”

Nate stops. Turns. “What?”

“You just said you have a best friend,” Gabe tells him. He can still taste the ice cream. Can see a smile, wry and clear. Can feel laughter. Light. “Who are you talking about? We’re all here.”

“I—” Nate opens his mouth. Closes it. “I—”

 _The secret. The thing you keep too close to think about_.

Gabe’s head pounds. There are stars in his vision. He feels like the moment in a dream he’s had to kill himself out of, the instant before he wakes.

 _I need you to remember_ , Tyson had said. _I need you to remember for me_.

* * *

_There was a man there, a boy, about Gabe’s age. Gabe bared his teeth at him—he didn’t know why Roy brought in someone else to this team, but he had it, he didn’t need help._

_The guy smiled back, but it was sharp. Just on the edge of mocking. Roy laughed, patted Gabe’s arm._

_“Don’t worry, kid, he’s not coming for your job,” he said. “This is Tyson. He’s our architect. Tyson, this is Gabe. The extractor.”_

_“Well you can’t be very good at it,” Tyson said, and Gabe’s back went up. He’d show—“I mean who would ever forget that face? Or that hair? You’ve got to stand out anywhere.” He’d turned red as he said it, but Gabe—relaxed. Laughed._

_“Oh, I’m very good,” he said. “I could find your secrets.”_

_Tyson snorted. That glint of a challenge was still in his eyes. “Yeah? Prove it.”_

* * *

_“Pull it together,” Gabe said. The dream was splintering around them. Nate’s dream—but now Nate was looking at Gabe with wild eyes. Gabe didn’t know what Nate had seen, but it was a dream. Things happened. And Nate was so good, but so young. He was new to this still. “Nate. You have to keep it together or the dream will break.”_

_“I am, I—”_

_“Nate,” Tyson interrupted. He pushed Gabe out of the way to wrap a hand around the back of Nate’s neck. “Come on, Dogg. Breathe for me.”_

_“I am breathing.”_

_“Nah, not well enough. Come on, you can’t let me do this better. Can’t let all this designing go to waste, can you? Let’s go, bud. In and out. You got this.”_

_Gabe watched, and Nate breathed, and slowly the dream settled._

_“I could have done that,” he muttered. Tyson rolled his eyes at him._

_“Sure, captain my captain. Leave something for the best friend, eh?”_

_Gabe swallowed down any protests. He was right, probably. But he was glad Tyson was there._

* * *

_Gabe was on a beach. Not just a beach, the sort of beach at fancy Caribbean resorts. Like the ones that he knew Tyson liked to go to on his off time. Except this one was different. More, more, with the impossibility of dreams—the flowers bloomed rainbows and smelled like calm; the birds that flew above them were dragons and parrots and things Gabe couldn’t name. A little ways down the beach a group of attractive men and women played beach volleyball. Even if Gabe didn’t trace out the Euro in his pocket to make sure it had the Tre Kronor of his dreams, Gabe would have known it was a dream._

_“Like it?” Gabe turned. Tyson was lying on a lounge chair, in a bathing suit that was riding a little up his thighs in a way Gabe couldn’t help but notice. He already had a drink in one hand. He didn’t look much like Gabe knew he looked in the real world. There, they were all drawn and tired from a long, awful slog of jobs and injuries where nothing seemed to go right._

_“Where is it?” Gabe asked. He sat down on the chair next to Tyson. The warmth of the sun was already sinking into him._

_Tyson shrugged. “I made it.” Of course he did. Of course Tyson dreamed up this wonderful, ridiculous place. “So?” He gave Gabe that look he did sometimes, like he actually cared what Gabe thought._

_“It’s great,” Gabe told him. Tyson grinned, brightened just from that. The last months had been wearing on him—all the dreams he designed falling apart. “Why are we here?”_

_“Because you need to relax, Gabriel,” Tyson retorted, rolling his eyes. That was what he had said before he had interrupted Gabe’s worrying about the team turning in on itself to bully him into the dream._

_Tyson gestured. A projection materialized next to them, an impossibly attractive man in a poolboy uniform. “My friend needs a drink,” he told the projection, who nodded._

_“Very good sir,” he said, winked, and walked away._

_Gabe laughed. “Really, Tys?”_

_Tyson shrugged and flushed, but he was laughing too. “Look, I don’t apologize for my dreams,” he shot back. “Should we visit your dreams sometime, see who you populate them with?”_

_Tyson was flushed and grinning in his tiny bathing suit under the summer sun, like the stress of the season was sloughing off of him. He looked good. He always looked good, even when he was convinced he didn’t._

_“Nah, I still need my drink,” Gabe joked back. “You’d think service would be better in your dreams.”_

_“Anticipation is half the fun,” Tyson said, and then flushed, and Gabe bit his lip too. “But—”_

_The waiter was back. Handed Gabe a violently pink drink. Gabe raised an eyebrow at Tyson. Tyson raised one back._

_“You’re in my dream, you drink my drinks, buddy,” he said, and Gabe did. It tasted too-sweet and too strong, because it was Tyson, but it also tasted like—like summer._

_Gabe tilted his head back to the sun. “I needed this.”_

_“Yeah, no kidding,” Tyson told him, and Gabe closed his eyes and let out a breath that he felt like he’d been carrying for months, as Tyson chattered next to him._

* * *

_Getting close is dangerous. Gabe had learned that from the beginning. Dreamshare was dangerous and the business was violent even outside of dreams. Gabe had seen too many people betrayed, had seen closeness fall apart with the stress of the job. Had seen closeness drive people to dreams, to lose themselves too much._

_It was hard to remember that, though. When Gabe was listening to EJ but watching as Tyson ushered the new kid around the room, introducing him to everyone as Tyson Jr. and informing them that he would disown them all if they liked the new Tyson better. Gabe knew, as well as the rest of them, that half of it was to make the new kid laugh, to make him feel in on the joke._

_Tyson’s laugh echoed around the room, and he nudged the new kid, who laughed too, still a little unsure._

_Getting close is dangerous, Gabe reminded himself._

_He still didn’t manage to look away._

* * *

_The blast of gunshots echoed around the room. Gabe, EJ, and Tyson all scrambled to blockade the door with all the furniture they could find. It only had to hold out against the projections until Nate finished with the subject. But that couldn’t come soon enough._

_The projections pounded on the door, but it held. Gabe turned back to look at his team. EJ was sweaty and bloody, but he nodded at Gabe. He pulled out a gun—then shook his head, and pulled out a bigger gun instead—and walked over to the window to look at the scene._

_It meant Gabe could look at Tyson, who had collapsed onto the bed. “Tys?” Gabe demanded. Tyson was pale, his arm wrapped around his stomach._

_Tyson looked up at him, then moved his hand, just a little. Enough for Gabe to see it was soaked through with blood._

_“I’m done,” he said. “No use to you like this.”_

_“Tys.” Gabe dropped to his knees in front of him. This was only a dream, and dying was no more than waking up. But the pain was real._

_Tyson tried a smile anyway. “I’d rather it go fast than slow. Well, for this.” Gabe snorted. Tyson was dying. But he’d laughed when Tyson died before, much like this. “Come on, Gabriel. Just shoot me already.”_

_“Yeah.” Gabe knew this was what they did. It didn’t make it easier, to pull out his gun. He brushed the hair off of Tyson’s forehead, then put the gun there too. “See you soon.”_

_“Tell Nate to hurry the fuck up, eh?” Tyson was laughing a little at himself when Gabe pulled the trigger._

_Gabe had seen Tyson die before. He’d seen all of them die before. Gabe still couldn’t look at the body sprawled on the bed, brains blown out. Tyson was only ever still in death._

_“That was sickening, I should have shot myself just so I wouldn’t see it,” EJ said. Gabe glared. He didn’t—he got it, but this wasn’t a joke._

* * *

_“We have Barrie,” the message said, and Gabe’s heart stopped. Next to him, he could feel Nate freeze too._

* * *

_The video screen was split. On one side, the man who had taken Tyson was still smiling at them, genial. On the other side it was—a room. Small, empty. A cell, really. Gabe had dreamed them often enough. A cell, and Tyson tied to a chair in the middle of it. He had a bruise on his temple and blood on his cheeks, and he was mad like Gabe’s barely ever seen him, glaring around the room._

_“What the fuck do you even want?” he yelled, and Gabe could see his gaze flit to the camera, hit on them for barely a second, then keep moving, almost too fast for anyone who didn’t know him to realize he had seen them. “The least you could do is talk to me—that’s what real kidnappers would do, you’re just amateurs, you don’t even—” something buzzes, and Tyson jerks like he’s been shocked. Tyson takes a long, rasping breath, then—“Oh, electric chair, terrifying, I—”_

_The feed cuts out. Nate makes a low sound behind Gabe. Gabe wishes he could do that too, but it just feels like—ice._

_“Not the quietest prisoner ever,” the man muses. “He’s definitely one we’ll have to make sure shuts up.”_

_Gabe swallows. Draws on ice, and picturing what he’ll do to this man at the end of this. “What do you want?”_

_“I told you.” The man smiled. “A secret.”_

* * *

_“Duchene?” Willy asked, astonished. “Gabe, he’s—too militarized. Roy militarized him himself. There’s no way we’ll manage it.”_

_Gabe knew that. Did he think Gabe didn’t know that? Gabe wouldn’t take this job for any amount of money._

_They knew that too. The people who took Tyson. And they’d found the thing that he would take this job for—that he’d take any job for. “We don’t have a choice,” he said. Nate met his eyes. The same sort of emptiness was there. Like something important was missing. “So find me a way.”_

* * *

_“We really don’t know how this will work, Gabe.” Kerf looked worried. Gabe found he didn’t care. They were all worried. He was worried. Terrified. He couldn‘t stop seeing Tyson tied to the chair, shaking as the electricity went through him. “This strain of somnacin isn’t tested, it’s—”_

_“It’s the best way to extract from someone as militarized as Duchene?” Gabe demanded. Reluctantly, Kerf nodded. Gabe glared at him, then around the room, where the team was waiting. “So it’s the best chance we have to do this job. This job, which we have to do well, or else Tyson will—or else we won’t get Tyson back.” Gabe looked around the room. Met everyone’s eyes in turn. Settled on Nate, who looked uncertain but set. He wasn’t handling this well either, Gabe knew. “Is that what anyone wants?”_

_No one said anything. The silence settled. Without Tyson to fill it, it felt empty._

_“Good. Then we’re doing it,” Gabe said. “I don’t care what we risk. We need to get him back.”_

* * *

_The IV was in Gabe’s arm, the PASIV hooked up. Next to them, Duchene was asleep already, drugged. Kerf was seeing to the rest of them. Nate looked over at Gabe. “Are you—”_

_“No,” Gabe admitted. But—“But I don’t care.”_

_Nate nodded. He didn’t look happy about it, but he didn’t object, either._

_“Ready?” Kerf asked, standing over them. Gabe thought of Tyson, and nodded. Kerf pushed the plunger, and started the dream._

* * *

“Gabe!” A hand is shaking Gabe’s shoulder. Gabe opens his eyes. He’s lying on a chair in EJ’s backyard. The backyard of a house EJ doesn’t own, has never owned. EJ has an apartment in various cities, but his home is the ranch. The whole team is leaning over him, looking worried. “Are you okay?”

“What happened?” Gabe asks, sitting up. His head still hurts like he’s been shot, but he can almost think again. He _can_ think again, for real.

“You passed out,” Nate tells him. “You said something about remembering, and then you looked like you were having a seizure and passed out.”

“No doing that here,” EJ adds, stern. “You can die all you want in the dream, but watch it in real life, yeah? We can’t spare you.”

“This is a dream.” Gabe stands up. Looks around at all of them. Not all of them. Not—“We’re still a layer down, we just forgot.”

“Gabe.” Nate and EJ exchange a look, one Gabe knows. They all know what happens, when dreamers lose hold of themselves. “No, we came up from the dream. It’s real.”

“No it’s not. I’m not—I haven’t lost track of anything, you have. You forgot. We all forgot.” Everyone is looking at him like he’s gone insane. Gabe shakes his head. “It was the somnacin we used, like in the first dream. It’s made everyone forget. We forgot the most important—Nate.” He whirls, looks at Nate. “Nate, we forgot Tyson.”

It gets him a blank look. “Tyson?”

This isn’t working. “Come on. Check your totems. This is a dream.”

“This is real,” EJ says, slowly, carefully. None of them are checking their totems. They’d be more careful, without drugs in their system. How had they forgotten to check? “Gabe, we—”

“Curly hair? Brown eyes. Makes everyone laugh?”

“I—I’ve seen him,” Nate says, slowly. His eyes are far away, and he’s rubbing at his temples. “Or that. He was in the dream.”

EJ’s face is terribly kind. “This is why you don’t talk to projections, Gabe,” he says, gently. “Just because you’re lonely and you made up your dream man—”

“He’s not—EJ.” Gabe turns in a circle. Meets too many worried eyes, and not enough that seem to understand. “We are in a dream. If any of you have ever trusted me, you will now. We’re in a dream, and we have to wake up, or our friend is going to be trouble.” He swallows. “Trust me. Check your totems. Just do it. Humor me.”

EJ sighs, but he turns away, to check the totem Gabe doesn’t know. Everyone follows suit, until—

“Shit,” Nate breathes, and then EJ. “How—”

“I don’t know,” Gabe says, and pulls out his gun. “But it’s time to wake up.”

* * *

Nate comes to on the chair of a hotel room, with the sort of headache he hasn’t gotten since the last time Tys argued him into celebrating a job well done with a night out.

The thought settles. Clicks into place. Then Nate opens his eyes, and—around him, everyone is pulling out IVs, shaking their heads; Kerf has hurried over to Josty to check on him, muttering something that sounds scolding. Nate grabs for the puck in his pocket, glances at it—the pattern is right on the side of it. This is real.

And if this is real—Nate jolts to his feet as Gabe scrambles up too, looking around frantically. Tyson. How had he forgotten Tyson? How had they—but if he—

“Where is he?” Gabe demands, his voice hoarse and eyes wild. Nate knows it’s not a dream anymore, but he looks like he’s ready to break anyway. “What—Kerf, how long have we been down?”

“Well…” Kerf starts, but then the door bursts open, and half a dozen hands go to guns before—

“Oh thank fuck that worked,” Tyson says, breezing in. He’s still got the bruise on this temple and now there are bruises on his fingers, the sort that look like they come from dislocation and there’s a deep, painful looking gash on his upper arm, but he’s—“Any brain damage?” he asks, of Kerf.

“None I can see yet,” Kerf tells him, and then Nate doesn’t let him get further than that before he grabs Tyson and pulls him into a hug.

“Don’t fucking scare me like that again,” Nate tells him. Tyson feels solid next to him, and Nate can’t—how had he forgotten his best friend?

“Watch the ribs, bud,” Tyson tells him, but he’s hugging back. “And you weren’t scared, you didn’t even remember me. I was the one who had to see you guys—”

“I was scared,” Nate corrects. He might not have remembered it, but—he hugs Tyson closer, trying to be mindful of whatever Tyson did to his ribs.

“Tyson.” Nate doesn’t particularly want to let go of Tyson, but Gabe’s voice is—like all of that intensity, that emptiness of the dream was channeled into that one word. When Nate looks over Tyson’s shoulder, Gabe is looking at Tyson like that too—like the first moment of wonder of a dream, when everything is too much to be real. “Tys?”

Nate lets go. Tyson turns. Nate can’t see his face, but he doesn’t have to. He knows what Tyson looks like, looking at Gabe.

“Hey, Gabe. Good job, with the whole remembering thing,” Tyson starts, and Nate can see him swallow. “That was—I did not know if that would work, but like, it was either kind of sort of incept you or get you to remember all at once and explode your brains, and I kind of like your head how it is so—”

“Tyson,” Gabe interrupts, and then he’s touching the bruise on Tyson’s face, something gentle and something desperate about it. “Are you—how did you—”

“What, you thought they could keep me?” Tyson snorts. “I mean, the cell was good, but it wasn’t good enough. They had so much room in the cuffs, and there was a—” Something in Gabe’s face must stop him, because he swallows. “So I got out, then I came here, and then you guys were lost, Kerf was pretty sure, so I went down and got you. Sort of. I mean, I got you to remember.”

“Tys,” Gabe says again. “This is real?”

Tyson snorts. “If you haven’t checked your totem by now, after all of this, then I really can’t help you.”

Gabe laughs, and—Nate hadn’t really realized how long it had been since he heard it. Since he had felt how it made them all relax. Or maybe it was just Tyson being there, how it settled Nate, anchored him. Or maybe it was just finally being out of the dream.

* * *

“I did miss you,” Gabe tells Tyson. They’ll scatter in the morning, but first Gabe has to make the price of Duchene’s secret clear, and Nate has to make them disappear in a way that will keep them safe. That’ll all happen tomorrow. Right now, Gabe’s managed to corner Tyson away from Nate, who also seems unwilling to let Tyson out of his sight, and into a room of the hotel all his own. Their own.

Tyson rolls his eyes. “No you didn’t. You didn’t remember me.”

“I—”

“I literally talked to you, and you had no idea who I was. You did not remember me.” The way Tyson says it makes it sound like it’s something he recited to himself more than once. His eyes dart away from Gabe.

“That doesn’t mean I didn’t miss you.” Gabe grabs Tyson’s face, guides it up so Tyson will look at him. His eyes are big and a little nervous. Gabe tries to remember everything that ever stopped him from saying this before, but he can’t. All of it feels suspended, lost in the dream. What was danger compared to Tyson here, to that aching place in himself gone? “There were more secrets, in the dream.”

“Oh?” Tyson’s quivering beneath Gabe’s hands, but he’s not moving away. “Finally figure out where you’re hiding my Christmas present?”

“It was a secret I kept close,” Gabe says. “Too close, maybe. Too close to talk about.”

Tyson blinks. “The kind you love?” He’s smiling, a little. Like he saw inside of Gabe and understood. Probably he did. They know each other’s dreams.

“Exactly,” Gabe says, and then he leans down and kisses Tyson. His lips are chapped and Gabe can still feel his face swollen under Gabe’s hands, and Tyson hisses a little like the kiss stings, but he gets his arms around Gabe’s neck and pulls him closer. It’s utterly imperfect, nothing dreamlike about it. It’s perfect.

* * *

Gabe drifts slowly out of sleep. The air is warm and heavy, wrapped around him. Or, no—it’s not air, not sky; it’s just arms wrapped around his side, a head on his chest. Breaths, in and out, the same rhythms as him. Gabe can feel the bed beneath him, knows the room is there. He breathes in too, in and out. Feels like the world is right, with Tyson next to him, with him.

Gabe wakes up.

**Author's Note:**

> Liked it? Want to talk about it? Don't think it made any sense at all and want to tell me that? Comment or come chat on tumblr at [ fanforthefics!](http://fanforthefics.tumblr.com/)


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